It's A Living
by Cap'nHoozits
Summary: A science fiction AU oneshot. Cargo pilot Scar reluctantly transports a couple of Amestrian kids. Originally posted in the Livejournal FMA Fic Contest.


**This was one of my favorites from the late lamented FMA Fic Contest. Scar might be considered out of character, but he's in character for this AU.**

 **If I can ever come up with more of a plot, I might expand it. But this is it for now.**

* * *

"By the way, you've got a passenger this time."

I wasn't overly surprised. It was a common enough occurrence. We carried what people paid us to carry. We could hardly refuse. When your planet has been rendered uninhabitable by a massive "accident", you live where other worlds allow you to live and you do whatever work you can get your hands on and you try to hold on to a faith that others ridicule you for. Enough said.

But the way Miles spoke made him sound like he was preparing me for something I wasn't going to like. He was right. I checked the screen on the ship's manifest pad. Then I checked it again. I looked up at Miles.

"An Amestrian? Are you serious?"

Miles seemed to consider how to answer me. Sympathetic? Authoritarian? Apathetic? He gave up and shrugged. "He's just a kid. He's not old enough to have been involved in—"

I held up the manifest pad. "He's on a trip to Xerxes Alpha to—"

"I know where he's going—"

"To study alchemy!" I spat out. I tossed the pad back at Miles. "Find somebody else!"

Miles finally opted for authoritarian. "You're the only pilot available right now!" he snapped back, holding the pad out to me. "He's paying extra."

"All the money in the galaxy isn't going to pay for what they did to us," I growled, but I knew there was no point arguing. A job was a job and I was lucky I had one. I gave a deep, ungracious sigh. "Fine. Whatever. He'd better not be late or I'm leaving without him."

* * *

I frowned at the kid. Then I frowned at the two-and-a-half-meter-tall robot standing behind him. "So is this a second passenger or cargo?"

The kid scowled back. "This is my brother," he replied, his voice as dark and threatening as a kid's voice was ever going to hope to get.

"That doesn't answer my question. Did you pay for an additional seat or is it—"

"He."

"—going in the cargo hold?"

The kid huffed and rolled his eyes. "I paid for three seats!"

I checked the manifest again. I was so irritated that I must not have looked closely enough the first time. "Fine," I mumbled. "We take off in fifteen minutes."

I turned away and headed for my ship. They followed me, the robot's feet clanking against the ramp. I paused and looked behind me.

The kid spread his hands. "What?"

I could tell already that this was going to be a long flight. "I don't like Amestrians," I told him. "I lost my family, most of my people, and my home world to your _experiment_. I wouldn't even take—"

"We're sorry."

I stared at the robot. The voice of a child had come out of it. Not a synthesized voice. A human child with human emotions. It sounded genuinely unhappy. Or "he" did, I guess I should say. He also sounded a little weary, like he was carrying a burden.

The kid reached back and tapped the robot's chest in an affectionate gesture. "We gotta look forward, Al," he replied with an encouraging grin. Then he turned back to me, his grin disappearing. "Look, my brother and I have done some shit in our lives, but it's mainly been to ourselves. We've never hurt anybody else and we sure as hell weren't responsible for frying your planet. We're trying to—"

"I don't care what you're trying to do," I cut him off, heading again for my ship. "I'm just taking you from point A to point B and I'm not being paid to listen to your sob story."

"Yeah, well…" the kid called after me. "I'm not paying any extra to listen to yours, either!"

"Sounds fair," I called back.

* * *

The kid fell asleep halfway there. The robot just sat there, taking up two seats, gazing out the window. I started to chant a meditation, partly because it was time and partly to kill time.

"What're you doing?"

I stopped and looked behind me. "What?"

The robot was looking at me. The face grille had what would have passed for eyes, and they glowed slightly. It should have been creepy, but the voice was so disarming that it really wasn't.

"Were you praying?" he asked. Then he shook his head. "Oh. Duh. Of course you were." He chuckled. Yes, that's right. He chuckled. "Stupid question. Sorry. I guess I'm bored."

"A bored robot," I remarked, turning back to the front to watch the stars whip by. I had lost the rhythm of my chant so I gave up for now. "You don't hear about those very often."

The robot was silent for several seconds. "I'm not a robot."

"Could've fooled me. Cyborg, then? I don't see any biologicals."

"My name is Alphonse, and this is only temporary," the not-robot explained. "That's the reason we're going to Xerxes. There's a really old library there, and Brother and I are hoping to find a way to reverse the process."

Xerxes was the birthplace of alchemy, so it didn't take much of an effort to guess what sort of "process" they were planning on researching. I didn't really want to know so I didn't encourage any more conversation. But the Alphonse must have been really bored.

"You see," he went on, "this casing contains my life force, and my body is in another dimension, and—"

I twisted angrily around in my seat. "What makes you think I want to know that?"

Alphonse gave a little start. "I—I just wanted to explain! Everybody thinks I'm a robot and I'm not!"

"No, I get it," I replied caustically. "You're the result of some sort of alchemical experiment gone horribly wrong, just like what happened to Ishval. Are you sensing a pattern here?"

Alphonse gave a soft, metallic sigh. He'd heard that one before, I'm sure. "Alchemy can do some good, too, you know."

"Uh-huh."

"That's what we want to prove, someday," Alphonse persisted quietly.

"Have fun with that." I really hoped that would be the end of it, but I couldn't help feeling like those illuminated eyes were staring at the back of my head. Not in a creepy way, but in a sort of melancholy teenager sort of way. I glanced behind me.

"How old are you?"

Alphonse seemed to perk up. "I'm fourteen!"

That shouldn't have made me feel sad. I shouldn't have cared. "How long have you been…" I nodded toward his robotic body.

"Six years."

I swiveled my seat around to stare at him. I swore in Ishvalan. "You poor damn kid!"

Alphonse drew himself up. "I'm not a poor damn kid!" he replied sternly. "I'm like this because I'd be dead otherwise. I don't need anybody's pity."

Well, I could certainly understand that sentiment. I'd been living it for the past several years. I nodded.

"Fair enough, Alphonse." I turned my seat to face the front screen and leaned back. "I hope you guys figure out what you need to do. Just don't tell me about it."

Alphonse chuckled again. "Fair anough."

Behind me, the other kid must have just woken up because I heard a loud yawn.

"Did I miss anything?" he asked.

"Not much," Alphonse replied cheerfully.

* * *

When we unloaded at Xerxes Alpha, the boys headed off toward the docking port. The older brother (whose name was Ed, once I took the trouble to check it on the manifest) strode off with a purposeful step, but Alphonse looked behind him and waved. It wasn't something I expected, but I was just standing there, watching them walk away. I must have been wondering what would become of them, whether they would finally be consumed by their godless alchemy or whether it would aid them in returning to some sort of normal life. What was a normal life anyway? How long had it been since I had one?

What the hell. I waved back.


End file.
